The say it shop has been open for 3 months

Today we celebrate our 3 month anniversary !! A big thank you to everyone who has supported us during this time.

I thought I'd look back over the 3 months and see what we've achieved.

In total we've sold:


48 cards or packs of cards

13 bracelets and necklaces

4 packs of gift tags

3 notebooks

We've had 181 visitors to the shop and 31 people reading the say it says blog.

We've got 29 'likes' on Facebook and 4 blog followers.



Not bad really. Lets see how the next 3 months compare...

Christmas is coming - make it from paper

In case you hadn't noticed, Christmas is coming! And, I'd like to promote buying handmade this Christmas, from myself or other handmade shops. So I've put together a selection of my favourite items from Folksy, to help you finish your Christmas shopping. If you're quick, they should arrive in time for Christmas - just click on the pictures to go through to the shop.

This blog post is also being entered into a competition run by Folksy. To have a chance at winning a Singer Sewing Machine, you had to put together your selection of 18 items from Folksy around the theme 'Christmas is Coming'. With thousands of wonderful handmade products to choose from, it wasn't easy.

Presents, decorations, gift wrap and tags - all these items that I've chosen are made from paper. It just shows you how much can be done with a simple sheet of paper and a little bit of skill. I'm amazed by how many lovely things there are made from such an everyday material. Who knows, maybe you'll be inspired to make something yourself!!

Nordic garland
by Corrina Field Handmade

Book flower brooch
by Bookity

Quilled Christmas decoration
by Pure Paper

Snowmen gift tags
by Craftie Nellie

Vintage look tags
by Ginger Rocks

Recycled snowflakes gift wrap
by Sophia Victoria Joy

Paper flowers
by Chicken and Custard

Decoupage bauble
by Classic Becca

Robin decoration
by Rae Welch

Mini Envelopes
by Swirlyarts

Reindeer card
by Ellson Design

Pass the parcel party game
by Louise Lockhart

Sheet music paper chain
by Lucie Kate & Hazey Jane

Personalised gift tags
by Shinta Shop

Christmas tree card
by Say it

Recycled magazine coasters
by re-crafts

Handmade notebooks
by Made to Make

Reindeer ornaments
by Happythought Paper Crafts

Only 4 days left to order before Christmas!

Still shopping for those elusive presents? If you'd like to buy them a gift from say it you'd better get your skates on - there's only 4 days left to order for your items to arrive in time for Christmas.

Of course, we'll still be here. We're not planning on going anywhere. It's just that snail mail doesn't work over Christmas, and they've not yet invented a way of emailing your order to you. So you can still place an order after Sunday 18 December, but it won't arrive in time for Christmas.

Better get shopping :-)

Threading beads

Ever wondered how to thread beads onto a string/cord/ribbon that's too big to thread through a needle, but not stiff enough to push through the beads by hand? After spending ages trying to poke ribbon through tiny beads this morning I decided there must be an easier way!

And there is! Armed with a collection of possible helpful items I returned to my necklace. Larger needles - no good because they wouldn't fit through the beads. Blunt pokey objects - ran out of patience. Needle threaders - perfect once I'd taken the end off!

So, if you ever need to thread beads onto ribbon (or other such stringing materials that don't fit through needles) here's my no.1 tip:

Get yourself a needle threader and take the end bit off so you're left with the wire (or just use a little piece of strong thin wire I guess!). Put the ribbon in the middle of the folded piece of wire, trapping it a bit like a needle. Poke both ends of the wire through the bead, and give it a good pull. It's quite fiddly, so I used pliers to hold the wire.

It worked a treat, and I had my ribbon necklace strung in no time :-)

Don't forget the special offers!

We're counting down to Christmas with 5 weeks of special offers. Into the fourth week now (how did that happen?!) we thought we'd remind you of this week's offer.

Fancy a completely free pack of tags? Just buy any 2 items. Go on, you know you want to!

What a weekend!

You go away for 2 nights and it all happens whilst you're not looking! Firstly, on Friday one of my Christmas cards was featured in a special blog post by Uniquely Yours, all about the online Christmas craft fair at folksy. She selected her favourite items from the shops signed up for the fair, and my Silver City Christmas card made the cut :-) Click here to read the blog post.

The second exciting thing to happen over the weekend was that I got my first order from someone I don't personally know. Up until now, it has been friends and family who have put in their orders, either through the folksy shop or face-to-face. I've been doing lots of advertising recently to try and grow my potential customer base and am so excited that it has worked. It takes a lot of time to do advertising, when I'd really rather be making things, so I'm thankful that it's beginning to pay off.

Maybe I should go away more often...

Only 28 shopping days left before Christmas

If you want to shop at say it and receive your goodies before Christmas, you'll need to order before Sunday 18 December. Any orders after this date are likely to arrive in the new year as we are closed over Christmas.

Also, did you know that there are only 30 days left to write and post your Christmas cards to friends and family in the UK? If you've not bought your cards yet, we have a great offer this week - get 4 packs of Christmas cards for £12.

Over 100 visitors to the say it shop!

It's time to celebrate :-) Google analytics tells us that we've had over 100 separate visitors to the say it shop. Between them, those 100 people have visited the shop over 300 times, and looked at more than 2000 pages! 

So thank you very much to our 100 visitors. If you each told just one person about say it, we could reach 200 visitors...! 

Countdown to Christmas

Christmas cards, decorations and gifts have been in the shops for ages, but only recently is it beginning to feel like Christmas is actually approaching. You just can't get excited about Christmas when it's October. It's not proper. But now it's less than 50 days away the countdown can begin...

And what better way to celebrate than with some super Christmassy special offers! To help you count down to Christmas we've got a different offer each week. 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. Each week's offer features the number of weeks left until Christmas. So at the end of the first week of offers, it's 5 weeks until Christmas.

The final week ends on Sunday 18 December, which is our last order date before Christmas. We'll then be on our hols and our friends at Royal Mail won't be able to get your order to you in time for Christmas.

Make sure you place your order in the right week to qualify for the offers shown. Each one is only valid for 7 days. Which offer will you choose?

New card design - liquorice allsorts

I was supposed to be getting on with Christmas cards yesterday. I have a large order in that needs making up by the end of the week and I'm less than half way through. But, I wondered, could I draw a liquorice allsort? And what would it look like on a card?

So I put down my scissors and started up photoshop on my computer. After a happy hour playing around with shapes and colours, I came up with three liquorice allsorts that looked yummy enough to eat. I've just added the new card to the shop this morning. Mmmmm :-)

Postcards now available

Thank you so much to everyone who voted for their favourite postcard designs. We're excited to let you know that they are now available to buy online. So head over to www.sayit.folksy.com to get your favourites.

The postcards are being sold in packs of four. We've spent a long time trying to work out the right combinations of postcards in each pack. Do you want four the same, or two each of two designs. Then, which designs should we combine? In the end, the top four winning designs are available in packs of four of the one design, or combined with one other similar design. And to make sure that everyone can have just what they want, we've also added a 'pick and mix' pack, so you can choose any four of the designs and they will be made up into your own special pack just for you.

Which ones will you choose?

ONE DAY SALE!

This week we've started joining in the fun on the folksy forums; talking to other sellers, contributing to threads, and getting the hang of how it all works. Thank you to everyone who has said hi, had a look at the say it shop or liked our facebook page. It's nice to be part of a community.

One of the things that these folksy folk seem to do is have a sale lasting one day. What a great idea. So, there are lots of lovely handmade things on folksy today that are in the sale. You have to get them today. Tomorrow they will be back up to full price and it will be too late to grab yourself a bargain.

Here's the list of goodies on sale today: http://forums.folksy.com/forums/7/topics/334185

And our contribution is the gorgeous Doho bracelet made from turquoise bugle beads. For today only you can get it for £5. It will be back up to £7 tomorrow. Go on, treat yourself!

Feeling creative? We need your help!

Now say it is up and running, we're thinking of branching out and adding a few more items. So, what would you like to see in the shop?

Have you had a look at the say it shop and thought, "if only they did..."? Are you a creative sort, brimming with ideas for things you would buy if only we could make them?

Use the poll on the left hand side to tell us what you'd like to see in the shop next. You can choose more than one. And if you have any other ideas, add them to this post as a comment.

Then we'll have a go at designing some of the most popular items.

Remember those postcard designs?

It seems such a long time ago that we did the poll asking you to choose your favourite postcard designs. You helped to pick the 10 designs that were worked up into final proofs and sent off to the printers. All these things take time, but the really exciting news is that we've just had an email from the printers to say that they've been dispatched. Woo! Hopefully that means they'll be available in the say it shop later this week. We can't wait to see what they look like and really hope that you like them. You must drop by and buy some of your favourite designs! 

New Christmas card design!

This morning I have been working on a new Christmassy design, and the resulting cards have just been added to the say it shop! These bold red and white cards are modern and stylish and I just love them :-) They're named 'lapland' due to the wintery feel - you can click on the pic below to head straight over to our shop to buy a pack.

Like say it on Facebook!

We now have our very own Facebook page. Join us to see what's new, what's selling well and, most importantly, make sure you don't miss out on any special offers.

www.facebook.com/sayitonline

Use the button on the left to 'like' our facebook page without needing to leave this blog. Simple!

Christmas is coming, the goose is getting fat...

... and it's time to start your Christmas shopping at say it!

The say it Christmas range is now available. Packs of 3 Christmas cards for £4.80 or 4 mini cards for £3.20. That's only £1.60 per card (or £0.80 for a mini card!) - a considerable saving compared to buying individual handmade Christmas cards in the shops. And if you're sending any cards abroad it's only 5 weeks until the last posting date for airmail to arrive in time for Christmas, so you'd best get shopping!

 

And for the perfect festive finish to your presents we've got some gorgeous Christmas gift tags. Just £2.00 for a pack of 3 or 4. What a wonderful way to label up your presents as you wrap them up and pop them under the tree. 

 

We'd love to be your favourite

So you've taken a look at the shop. And you like what you see. You're sat there thinking "this is one of my favourite online shops". What next?

Well, you could buy something! But if that's a step too far (or you've already bought one of everything) why not think about 'favouriting' the say it shop? Just click this little button here...

It would mean a lot to us.

Only 11 weeks to Christmas!

Have you started your Christmas shopping yet? With only 11 weeks to go until Santa makes his annual visit, we've been working hard on our Christmas designs. They're not quite ready to be added to the shop yet, but we thought you might like a sneak peak at what's coming soon.

Say hi 2 say it

We like talking. It's important to say things, such as "I like your necklace" or "mind how you go". Conversation builds relationships.

We talk to you through this blog. We tell you about special offers or new products. But what we'd really like is to hear back from you. It's lonely having a one way conversation. Will you join in?

Say hello by commenting on this blog post or send an email to sayhi2sayit@googlemail.com. Tell us what your favourite product is so far. Share with us your ideas for new products and what you'd like to see in the future. Or simply say hello.

Go on, say hi 2 say it!

And the winner is...

Thank you for voting for your favourite postcards. We've done the maths, and we're going to get the following 10 postcards printed. It might take a few weeks for them to arrive, as we're going for high quality professional printing, but hopefully it won't be too long before you can buy your favourites from the say it shop.